About the Book

The Beginning

"My first real job was as an Engineer in the Merchant Navy. At sea we felt fear of fire, rocks, drowning (and being found naked trying to climb into fridge), but it was no comparison to the fear I felt sat in a cubicle in my first office job. This Kafkaesque fear radiated from the people around me. There were rules to be followed, confusion as to why they existed, yet a fear of breaking them. I rarely spoke to my comrades around me, we kept our heads down, built a bubble around ourselves, and dutifully soldiered on."

The End

"I'm done with fear. Letting go, fellowship, openness, courage and reflection replace it, and like fear they slowly spread. We change our life, maybe our teams, perhaps our organisations. This is not a fad, a methodology, a process or tool. This change is a slow, deep, cultural one. At times it seems impossible, armour seems impenetrable, the weight of hierarchy constraining us. This isn't a program, these are networks of real people, relationships, egos, more complex than we can hope to understand. Making work better takes persistence, enquiry, empathy and continual learning."

The Rest

This book is about making sense of the senseless; understanding why people behave the way they do at work, and how it's possible to change that by building supportive relationships, rather than competitive ones. By removing the problems that hold us back we can find time for creativity and reflection and bring joy back to our work lives.

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About the Author

For as long as I can remember I've felt like an outsider observing and trying to make sense of peoples behaviours and interactions. My working life began with 5 years at sea followed by more years of monotony in an office where I began developing software. A New York startup and discovering the Agile movement turned me on to trying to create better ways of working. Becoming part of a software team with a degree of self-organisation made that a reality. Writing this book has been a process of trying to join the dots of these observations with theory and practice from, amongst others, Daniel Kahneman, Chris Argyris, Marshall Rosenberg and Nancy Kline. I hope it can help you work out the problems you face at work and discover better ways of working together and creating great software.

Table of Contents

Fear

We fear criticism so follow, it take courage to lead

Fear stops us from feeling, Empathy takes courage.

Fear stops us from listening

Fear kills thought, freedom nurtures it

Fear makes us abusive,

Fear stops us from acting, openness requires us to act

Fear stops us from communicating, learning depends on communication

Fear stops us from changing

Fear stops us from learning

My fear makes others fearful, openness encourages trust.

Conclusion

Blame

Panic and blame

Blame and Guilt

Blaming is judgement

Blame is Impotent

Blame as an alternative to relationships

Losing my pride

Blame is like driving a bulldozer through think fog,

Listening clears the fog

Separation creates blame

Underhand blame

Blame creates separation

Reality has no time for plans

Proximity heals

Conclusion

Openness

Management Visibility

Frank

Automate

Ignoring it doesn’t make it go away

A toolbox for visibility

Doing the right thing

Hierarchy and Equality

Unprepared for vulnerability

Separation

A sandwich of dysfunction

Protection

Come together

Life without hierarchy means treating each other as equals

Life without hierarchy takes collaboration

Life without hierarchy requires us to be social

Life without hierarchy takes patience

Life without hierarchy takes courage

Life without hierarchy is creative

Removing hierarchy

What should leaders do?

Conclusion

Collaboration

Why do we work alone?

Why might we work better together?

Standup

Taking steps together

Pair

I like to think working with you would be easy but it’s fraught with danger

All we had to do was listen.

What does it feel like?

Creativity

Dogma is the enemy of creativity

Fear is the enemy of creativity

Attachment is the enemy of creativity

Safe to fail

Creative Discipline

Individual creativity, team creativity

Stifled Creativity

Sharing Creativity

Inspiration

Customers

When to create, when to copy

Conclusion

Reflection

Who?

When?

So what’s the purpose?

Does what we are doing contribute to the purpose?

How can we reflect?

Dialogue

Conclusion

Let Go

Lose Control

Listen

Collaborate

Self Organise

Be open

Be Vulnerable

Make Time to Reflect

Don’t Judge

Friendship, Fellowship, Love

Create

Let it Emerge

When people are reluctant to let go

Current ways of working are making us sick, is this the cure?

If not us then who?

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